Democrats: Pitts column gets it wrong

Re: “Dems lack stomach, spine for shutdown,” (TNT, 1/24).

While I am an admirer of columnist Leonard Pitts Jr., sometimes he misses the mark, and he did so with this column.

Pitts’ strategic advice to the Democratic Party (appeal only to a very defined base; don’t try to reach people Democrats have alienated in the past) is the strategy that has been losing elections for Democrats for years and is still losing elections.

And it’s the strategy that in part led to the election of President Trump.

As long as the party sends the message that it does not care about the lives of poor, working-class and middle-class people if those people also are white, Democratic candidates will lose elections — even in places that for years were solidly Democratic.

And they should lose. Because that message does not reflect the values of a party that wants the American dream to be achievable for all.

Folks on the left talk about being inclusive; well, that should mean everybody, not just a narrow “base.”

That’s how you win elections and govern fairly. Elected officials work for us all.

This story was originally published January 28, 2018 at 2:51 PM with the headline "Democrats: Pitts column gets it wrong."